The Opportunity

from the book "The Entrepreneural Parent" by Paul and Sarah Edwards and Lisa M. Roberts

For most of us, driving with the flow of traffic seems like the right thing to do. Step on the gas pedal to pull ahead on a highway and you feel like too much of a risk-taker, tagged for a ticket. Lighten the pressure up on the gas pedal and you feel like you are holding everybody up behind you, then inadequate as others pass yours by. Keeping up, keeping pace is an easier ride. To go with the flow is natural.

But what happens when the flow breaks the recommended speed limit,or when traffic jams and you feel restless and stuck in a line of slow progression? With this new awareness, is keeping pace still the intuitive move to make? At what point do you decide to slow down, speed up, or exit the highway altogether and find a better suited traffic flow for you on an alternate route?

The flow of workplace traffic today is dual income households. After years of drifting the prevalent current, many parents feel stuck in a routine rut that pushes children and parents alike into stifling schedules and a sense of entrapment. Others have grown startlingly aware that the frenetic pace of a full-time, year-round, double income lifestyle may be putting their families at risk of a major emotional "collision." While they certainly hope that won't happen, as the rush of time whips through their daily schedules like a strong and persistent wind, they feel more and more vulnerable, more and more worn down.

With the global economic meltdown lingering over our rooftops, an alternate road becomes too important not to seek. More so with the mass lay offs at once great and formidable companies.
Fortunately, a back road that has been there since early 2000 has been gaining ground. One that is surprisingly close by and getting better paved and better serviced all the time. The travellers of this roads are called "Entrepreneurial Parents".

These are working parents who earn their living at home where they could put the brake on their work time whenever they need to without disrupting anyone else's flow or move full speed ahead when opportunity arises. Above all, they have a resolute need to be in the driver's seat around the clock when it comes to parenting their children. They are designing businesses that will grow no bigger than the walls of their homes can contain, taking control of their careers so their time can stretch and flex around the everyday needs of their families.